Emanuel Ax (born 1949), American pianist, winner of the first Artur Rubinstein International Piano Competition, became a major contemporary interpreter of the traditional piano literature who was also willing to explore serious new compositions for the piano.

Emanuel Ax was born in Lwow, eastern Poland in 1949. His father, a coach at the Lwow Opera House, was the pianist's first teacher. Ax commenced his study of the piano when he was seven years old. One year later his family moved to Warsaw, and soon after, having secured exit visas, they emigrated to Winnipeg, Canada, where they had relatives. In 1961, after a year and a half in Canada, the family moved once more, this time to New York City. Emanuel Ax, then 11 years old, enrolled in the Pre-College Division at Juilliard. His only formal piano teacher at Juilliard was Mieczslaw Munz, with whom he studied for four years, eventually winning the...